Social Anxiety Disorder, or "Social Phobia" as it is commonly known, is an anxiety disorder in which the individual has the anxiety that he or she may be judged by others, the idea that he or she will be embarrassed or embarrassed in social environments, and a very distinct and persistent fear of this. It is also called Social Anxiety Disorder. Social Phobia is a type of anxiety. It is one of the common psychological disorders.
Social phobia is known as a disorder among anxiety disorders in psychology. Since phobias are fears experienced in certain situations, social phobia can be defined as anxiety experienced in social environments. A socially phobic person has a scenario like this in their mind: "These other people in the social environment must be finding me weird, ridiculous, or embarrassing right now." Therefore, this illogical scenario causes the socially phobic individual to feel anxiety and even great fear of these situations. From this perspective, it is possible to recognize the following about social phobia; Social phobia is an irrational, persistent, stubborn fear of the existence of others that is beyond the individual's control (like all other emotions). He experiences an extremely high level of feeling that he will behave in a way that will make him feel ashamed or that he will be negatively evaluated and humiliated. Individuals are afraid of situations that require them to interact with others or to perform an action in the presence of others, and they try to avoid them as much as possible.
The following scenario explains very well how people with social phobia feel when they encounter a social situation. Just close your eyes for a second and imagine walking into a room and seeing some of your friends and colleagues there, suddenly you look towards the floor and realize you have no clothes on. After such a scenario, you will probably feel "great shame, you want to run away from the room, you feel as if you are going to die, you do not want to see anyone again." or they fear situations in which they must perform an action in front of others and try to avoid them as much as possible. They think that others will judge them as anxious, weak, crazy, or stupid. They may be afraid of public speaking because they are worried that they will notice that their hands or voice are shaking, or they may feel extreme anxiety when talking to others because they are afraid of appearing to be unable to speak properly. They may avoid eating, drinking or writing in front of others because they are afraid that they will be embarrassed if other people see their hands waving.
Although the subtypes of social phobia are still unclear, they are generally divided into two subtypes, common and uncommon. Common type of social phobia is the person's feeling of anxiety in every situation, while uncommon social phobia is the person's feeling of anxiety in certain situations (giving a speech, performing, going on stage, asking questions...).
/> History
The concept of social fear dates back to 400 BC. Hippocrates stated that shy people are those who adopt darkness as their life and think that others are observing them. The concept of social phobia was first introduced by psychiatrist Janet in 1903; It was used for patients who fear that other people are observing them while writing, speaking and performing. Social phobia was first described by Marks and Gelder in 1966.
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (English: The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, briefly DSM) prepared by the American Psychological Association. ) In DSM-II, all phobic disorders are grouped under the heading of phobic neuroses. In those years, social phobia had a very narrow definition. In 1980, social phobia was included as a unique diagnosis in DSM-III. Studies conducted according to the diagnostic criteria in DSM-III have shown that the number of social environments in which anxiety and fear are experienced is high. In DSM-III-R, a change was made in the criteria for social anxiety to be seen in more than one place. A. In addition, the condition that social phobia cannot be attributed to "avoidant personality disorder" has been removed. The term “generalized” was coined because fear and anxiety appear in most social environments. The term generalized refers to widespread social phobia, that is, most of the social environment. In DSM-IV, the diagnostic criteria are further clarified. The criterion that the individual is afraid of showing anxiety symptoms has been added.
Social phobia is included in the DSM-V as "social anxiety disorder". Because social phobia causes more dysfunctional behaviors and problems than other phobias. In DSM-V, changes were made to the social phobia criteria in previous DSM editions. There is still criticism that these criteria do not fully define social anxiety disorder. The 9th edition of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-9) included social phobia in the presence of phobic syndrome, as in DSM-II. In 1990, social phobia was included in the 10th edition of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10). The diagnostic criteria of social phobia in ICD-10 and those in DSM-IV are similar.
Social Phobia or Shyness-Shyness?
Timidity and social phobia are sometimes combined. can be mixed. The distinction between shyness and social phobia is an important point in diagnosing social phobia. An individual may be confused whether the symptoms he sees in himself are shyness or social phobia, and this is quite natural. Situations such as public speaking and hesitation to express oneself in some social environments can happen to many people. Shyness in matters such as expressing oneself in such environments is a common situation. A large portion of these may not be defined as mental disorders. For this reason, such situations are not considered symptoms of social phobia, they are natural situations that occur in the flow of life. In addition to such fears, experiencing avoidance behaviors and feeling intense anxiety may indicate social phobia. In addition, a socially phobic individual knows very well that the fear of that situation is too much and unnecessary, and that this is an abnormal situation. can feel. The individual is this extreme and If the patient tries to endure meaningless fear and anxiety and tries to overcome it, he may experience great difficulties. Symptoms seen in events and situations where one should actually feel fear, that is, where feeling fear is meaningful and normal, do not indicate the presence of social phobia. For example, a student who has never studied oral language is afraid of his name being called in class. This fear is a very natural fear. Most of such situations are not within the scope of disease. Even before starting a job, "Will I be embarrassed if I can't do it?" The thought can motivate a person and help him prepare better. To qualify as social phobia, the person must have avoidance behaviors as well as fear. Or if the person does not escape, but forces himself to endure this situation; Only then can one talk about social phobia if one is experiencing great distress.
Stress and tension are factors that increase success up to a certain level. This stress pushes the person to be more prepared, to work harder, and to struggle to protect their image, human relationships, and job. However, as stress increases, its effectiveness in this direction decreases, and due to stress, things that could be done more comfortably under normal conditions become impossible to do. In other words, the relationship between stress and success reverses after a while.
Social phobia patients do not look at what is actually going on, but focus on their "own feelings" caused by the feared situation. This has been assumed to be the main difference between social phobia and shyness. Shy people are in social environments with similar symptoms seen in social phobics, they take other people's reactions into consideration; For example, realizing that they are not boring and that they are accepted causes their negative thoughts and anxiety to end. Social phobics, on the other hand, cannot make such an evaluation. They do not seek to be informed about how others see them; because this situation is perceived as threatening, as it increases the risk of negative evaluation.
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